Why the Windows Store is not ready for games AAA-class

Why the Windows Store is not ready for games AAA-class

At the end of January was the official release of Rise of the Tomb Raider on PC. In addition to Steam, a new history of Lara Croft was published in the Windows Store, making it the first game AAA-class in the app store from Microsoft. In April, it will join another potential hit called Quantum Break. There was even talk that at this rate, the Windows Store could become a real competitor to Valve’s Steam. But is he ready for this?

A quick comparison of Rise of The Tomb Raider on Steam and versions that are sold directly to Windows 10, shows that the latter has some serious limitations, but through no fault of the developers.

The problem is in the application of a universal application system that is used for publishing games (and other programs) in Windows Store. In particular, it imposes restrictions, which are for projects AAA-class seem to be just absurd.

Game Store is not a desktop program

Steam and other distribution platforms to sell games in the form of the usual Windows programs. On the other hand, buying the game (or app) in the Windows Store on your computer downloaded a batch of files. To access these files you must have administrator privileges, which, however, make only a partial change. In other words, if you ever need to edit the game files in case you encounter some problems with the launch or to fine tune parameters, this limitation will not allow you to do this.

Fashion and record gameplay

Packaging in versatile applications, games bought in the Windows Store will not allow:

Disable VSync: whether you like it or not, you will not be able to abandon the use of VSync in the game, which was purchased in the Windows Store – vertical sync is enabled by default.

Set fashion: it is because of the protection system, which is used in generic applications can not modify or add other files into the game.

To use the Steam Controller: bought a game controller from Valve and want to use it with the game from the Windows Store? Get ready to be disappointed, because Steam doesn’t recognize programs that are not executable. exe file.

To enable the overlay or record a video: as mentioned, Windows Store games are not recognized by Steam and, therefore, cannot be used in Big Picture mode. Problems can arise even when trying to record gameplay using programs like Fraps. The overlay, by the way, in universal games, too.

It should be noted that the recording of games is possible with the DVR function, which contains the Xbox app for Windows 10. However, this function works very unstable, which makes it almost unusable for recording long gaming sessions.

Support SLI and CrossFire

Your system has multiple graphics cards from AMD or NVIDIA and you want to take advantage of the CrossFire or SLI? You can forget about it.

The lack of support for working simultaneously with multiple graphics cards to improve performance of the graphics engine is another limitation of the «store» version of Rise of the Tomb Raider.

Again, the reasons are to be found in the peculiar structure of universal apps because the Steam version of the game allows you to use graphics cards in SLI and CrossFire.

Backup function

It is not there. Windows Store does not allow you to create a backup of your own apps. You can’t save the game onto another disk, for example, to transfer it from one computer to another. All files have to be downloaded again each time. In the case of Rise of the Tomb Raider we are talking of the order of about 26 GB and Quantum Break will weigh even more.

This is the current situation in the app store, which currently can not give even some of the usual features of Steam, but all is not lost. If Microsoft really wants to create a competitor to Steam, the company will have a long way to go, but we can’t rule out that one fine Store Windows will turn into something that will make nervous people at Valve.